John Thompson

"If the future is the apocalypse," Bridgeport native and artist Ed Marszewski declaimed to the New York Times in February, "then Bridgeport is the community of the future." Marszewski should know: as the leader of Lumpen, an artist collective headquartered in Bridgeport, and the editor of that organization's eponymous periodical, Marszewski is used to making such statements in order to draw attention to a host of social and artistic causes he finds firsthand in the neighborhood's warehouse shadows. History would seem to justify Marszewski's macabre gesture. Bridgeport is arguably the most "Chicagoan" of Chicago communities; marked by a history of violent racism, class conflict and corrupt machine politics, the neighborhood includes the now-empty shells of stockyards and killing floors that made Chicago the "hog butcher to the world," as well as the neon-lit whiskey frontier along 35th Street which waters the community's blue-collar population during White Sox games.

Bridgeport's rough reputation, however, conceals its growing appeal for aesthetes, connoisseurs and cultural activists. The neighborhood is becoming decidedly bipolar following an influx of cultural aficionados, residents in every way at odds with the traditional working-class vibe of the South Side burg. The relationship between the two sets, the artist and the worker, are noticeably tenuous. The most recent issue of Lumpen magazine features a scathing indictment of Bridgeport natives by Liz Mason, a representative of Quimby's Bookstore who experienced the neighborhood firsthand as part of Lumpen's Select Media Festival in the fall.

The stream of incoming artists has not been stemmed. Indeed, members of Chicago's cultural elite are attracted to Bridgeport in no small part by Lumpen's annual festivals--the Select Media Festival and Version. Select Media Festival, held every fall, is staged solely in Bridgeport and emphasizes Lumpen's liberal social agenda, which addresses poverty, discrimination and urban blight through artistic media. Version, currently running through May 7, better reflects Lumpen's citywide appeal; events are scattered on the South and West Sides, while artists, visitors and gallery owners from throughout the city flock to Version's main staging headquarters in Iron Studios, 3636 South Iron Street, a quaintly refurbished, multi-storied exhibition center and artists' living space nestled among the gaunt skeletons of distribution facilities and warehouses abutting Ashland Avenue.

This past Saturday, Iron Studios played host to Version's centerpiece event, the NFO XPO ("Info Expo"), where galleries, artists and political-advocacy groups showcased their work, networked with friends and vied for attention from milling patrons. Here, where the exposed bricks and whitewashed cast-iron doors effect the same kind of sanitized nostalgia which underlies vintage fashion, the new typecast identities converging in response to Bridgeport's arts boom--self-conscious hipsters, ardent anarchists, pop artists, middle-class enthusiasts--made the potential identity crisis facing Bridgeport feel especially immediate. Fine art, and its attendant trappings of pretense and arcana, being shown in a traditionally working-class community stereotyped as having lowbrow sensibilities seemed contradictory.

The transplants are conscious of their status as newcomers. "Honestly, this is the most time I've spent in Bridgeport that wasn't at a Sox game," Raver Emanuel, a member of the art collective Structures Without Integrity participating at the NFO XPO, readily admits. The Edgewater resident continues, "I'm glad I came, though; this is a great space. I wouldn't normally come because it's not close at all, and it's incredibly hard to find." Other artists seemed to concur: if Bridgeport has any salient geographic characteristic, it's that the neighborhood feels isolated from the rest of the city. For many, however, Bridgeport's seclusion only adds to its allure. "I've definitely had my eyes opened up," Nell Taylor from the Ukrainian Village-based Chicago Underground Library explains. "I like the sparseness of the neighborhood. I'm very much into the older, less-crowded parts of the city, and Bridgeport has a unique, original flavor." Stephanie Pavone, co-director of Booster and Seven in West Town, thinks that the closed community condenses and intensifies the artistic spirit within it: "It's a bit of an adventure to get here, so all the people who dare to make the trip are really excited."

The energy at the expo was certainly palpable. Participants running around making adjustments to their displays kicked up dust settled on the periphery of the exhibition space. Event assistants chatted on cell phones while they unloaded equipment from the facility's brightly painted service elevator. Version was not devoid of Lumpen's activist touch, either; a small contingent of pro-choice advocates and vocal anarchists manned tables in the center of the room, one draped with a T-shirt spray-painted with a design featuring one stick figure blowing the brains out of another. A caption underneath read "CAPITALISM." Outside, the mournful Chicago sky, spitting rain, defiantly filled the view from the windows.

The contradictions seemed overwhelming: a renovated warehouse cum gallery, alive with North Side artists, run by social activists, set in one of the most unlikely neighborhoods to host an art gallery, but one of the most likely communities to harbor anarchists. The mixture of the aesthetic and political, progressive and regressive, highbrow and lower-middle-class within this particular setting seemed jarring, but Renay Kerkman, from Gallery Chicago, seems unimpressed by these sentiments. "There have always been artists here," she explains. "Especially those wacky Lithuanians."

Bridgeport has indeed been home to artists for some time, including two of Chicago's most eminent artistic personalities: the Zhou brothers, Shanzuo and Dahuang, proprietors of the Zhou B Arts Foundation. The two Chinese émigrés settled in Bridgeport more or less by accident. "When we came to the neighborhood around twenty years ago, we didn't even know it was called Bridgeport," Shanzuo recalls with a chuckle. "We just drove around and got a pretty good feeling; we were close to the city and we felt comfortable in the studio space. We were also going back and forth to Europe, so we didn't know how long we were going to stay in Chicago." Since settling in the area, however, the Zhou brothers have carved out a small empire near the intersection of Morgan and 35th Streets, where they own five buildings--all dedicated to the advancement of the arts. The brothers' real estate acquisitions are surpassed in impressiveness only by their status as international superstars with connections in China and Europe. They periodically teach in Hamburg and Salzburg when they're not meeting presidents and mayors or teaching international students at the newly christened Zhou B. Art Center. They now stand to become Lincoln Academy Laureates early this month, the highest honor the state of Illinois can bestow on its citizens.

It is a testament to Bridgeport's geographic and cultural isolation that the brothers long went unnoticed in their own neighborhood. Dahuang remembers, "We had been here almost twenty years and nobody knew us. Then one day a neighbor brought over a copy of the Tribune newspaper with our picture in it and said, `Oh, that's you?!' Then we started becoming famous around here." He smiles.

The brothers' relative anonymity within the community was probably due to their humble beginnings. "That was the first building we owned," Dahuang pointed out during a recent tour of the Zhou brothers' holdings. Across the street was a little tenement, mostly unremarkable except for the doors, which the brothers had adorned with their own special ornaments.

The brothers gradually expanded their property as they continued in the neighborhood. "I remember when this was an empty lot sunk below street level," Dahuang says, overlooking the Zhou brothers' sculpture garden which elegantly adjoins the brothers' gallery on Morgan Street. The space is now one of the most verdant urban yards seen anywhere, dotted with the brothers' mystically beautiful handiwork. He continues, "The trash would blow into it off the street, then back out into the street. I used to bring my dog here to do its business." The sculpture garden, long an ambition for the brothers, was made literally overnight a few years ago from sod and transplanted trees to receive--and impress--guests from Switzerland.

The Zhou brothers' prestige and ambition has culminated in the monumental Zhou B. Art Center, a former warehouse with 87,000 square feet of space that dwarfs the rest of the Zhou B. estate. The bottom floor showcases work by international artists and Zhou B. students, while the other floors provide studio and performance space. The top floor contains the brothers' own studio. A gift shop and café are currently being installed. The café, the brothers hope, will turn into a place where artists and friends can get coffee and sandwiches. "And alcohol," Dahuang is quick to add. "Very important for artists."

Everything the Zhous have done and accomplished, though, is due to their passion and boundless ambition. That Bridgeport is the place where they have bloomed is largely incidental. Dahuang makes clear, "Art is our life and our love." Shanzuo adds, "All these things are dreams come true. I'm very happy to see more artists coming to Bridgeport and hear people talking about the neighborhood. But we would have been happy in any place."

The Zhou brothers' pure passion and organic integration into Bridgeport seems at odds with the conscious injection of artistic sensibilities into the community found at Version. "They're really trying to make this an artistic community," Nell Taylor observes. "Edmar (an affectionate nickname for Marszewski) and Lumpen are trying to force a community to build here, which is unusual because I see most city neighborhoods develop organically over time, so this is especially bold."

Edmar may not have to do much to get artists to stay, however. Expo participants remarked at the relatively cheap costs for exhibiting in Bridgeport. Brittany Reilly, Stephanie Pavone's partner at Booster and Seven, says, "Version is attractive because there's a great group of people to work with. But it's also not expensive to exhibit here." Taylor remarks, "Bridgeport is certainly opposed to the North Side, where I keep moving farther and farther west to escape high rents and the Wicker Park crowd. It's definitely more affordable down here." Artists following cheaper rents have traditionally precipitated the gentrification of other parts of the city. In the self-conscious universe of Version, however, where social progressivism is as prevalent as edgy artwork, the "g-word" is off limits. "The moment you say that, people's heads will start spinning around while they projectile-vomit pea soup," says Raver Emanuel. I wondered if Bridgeport might be ready for gentrification whether Lumpen liked it or not.

During one conversation, a feud over social theory elsewhere in the studio hit a higher register and someone screamed, "Those are anarchists! Of course they're gonna say that!"

Then again, Bridgeport may not be ready after all.

(2006-05-02)

Also by John Thompson

Critical Music
Blood-and-guts art-punk that goes for the jugular and clamps on it with a wink and a smirk--that's the brand of rock South London's Art Brut has brought the world since releasing "Bang Bang Rock & Roll" last year
(2006-03-28)

about Newcitychicago | about Newcity magazine | advertising | privacy policy | FAQ | employment